


That Night In Maguuma

by red-catmander (maximum_overboner)



Series: Ad Meliora [3]
Category: Guild Wars 2 (Video Game)
Genre: Awkward Romance, Back at it again with the cat boning, Drunk Sex, F/M, Friends to lovers... to friends... to lovers again-- it's complicated, Mutual Pining, One Night Stands, Sexual Tension, Unprotected Sex, also canach is there being very very mean, smutty character study, two middle-aged soldiers try and fail to navigate basic feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:20:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28230798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maximum_overboner/pseuds/red-catmander
Summary: The Jungle Dragon is dead and what remains of the Pact are left to recuperate and comb through its dire bounty. With plenty of good food, strong alcohol and lingering regrets, it's easy to see an old friend in a new light.In fact, it's impossible to do anything but.
Relationships: Rytlock Brimstone/Player Character
Series: Ad Meliora [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1666561
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20





	That Night In Maguuma

**Author's Note:**

> it's my video game cat and i get to make her smooch the idiot
> 
> oh, just to make you aware, that violence/major character death tag is to cover my bases as far as the discussions of eir and trahearne go. nobody is cocked to death.
> 
> hope you enjoy it!

“Eat it?”

“Yes.”

“All that food?”

“Alcohol, too. The berries break down quickly.”

Emberthroat ate a wad of mango, fighting the urge to pull a face. Ibli licked his eyes and handed her another mango. She looked at it wearily and thanked him, eating that one too.

“And you’re _sure_ you have enough?”

Kaana Miatli peered at her under shiny, see-through eyelids. “For many, many months.”

Emberthroat blinked stupidly. She drank what they gave her, thanking them profusely. This was more bitter than sweet, a thick pulp with little seeds. “And we’re… Doing _you_ the favour?”

“Yes, Commander. I would be so relieved. The thought of all that food going to waste makes my stomach churn. I could ask every member of my tribe to dry, salt, preserve and pickle every waking moment for the next six months and not make a dent in what we have. Eat. Drink.” She nodded. “I hope this is not an imposition, especially considering what you’ve done.”

“I am… Sure my men will adjust. How did you come across all this food?”

The Kaana paused. She turned to her son. They let loose long, low croaks Emberthroat lacked the means to hear. They spent some time like that before, finally, Miatli looked at her again. She pushed a plate towards Emberthroat, tiny parcels of cooked meat in various leaves.

“I’m _really_ quite full—”

Miatli waited patiently. Emberthroat started on the plate.

“The Mordrem,” she said, “have been cultivating plants.”

“The _Mordrem?_ I didn’t know they ate.”

“They didn’t, the jungle dragon gave them the energy they needed. It seems they accounted for shortages.”

“In…?”

“Bodies. These were to be turned to mulch to nourish blighting trees.”

Emberthroat stopped chewing. Ibli passed her a plate of grubs.

“Thank you,” she said, weakly. These were pretty good. They reminded her of the food in the fahrar. “I’ll put it to my men.”

“If they make it past you!” Miatli joked.

“Excuse me?”

“We were hoping you would share the bounty with your troops,” said Ibli, “but you began eating and eating...”  
  


* * *

  
Emberthroat, full and a little sick, took her place on the platform, thinking very, very carefully about what she was going to say. The sea of people seethed under her, spilling up and out onto branches.

“So I had a talk with the hylek chief and she has… Invited us to take any surplus goods. If you’re hurting for supplies, be here for nightfall.”

A voice from the throng. “Like what?”

“Food.”

A murmur of approval rippled through the assembled troops.

Emberthroat braced herself, digging her claws into the tree trunk and pinning her ears back.

“... And alcohol.”

A triumphant cheer tore through the crowd. Hats were thrown, swords waved. Someone fired shots into the air. She rushed to quell the tide of noise.

“Whoever did that is getting a beating and dumped in the pit for the night. You’re trained soldiers, not cubs fighting for the last coconut. There’s plenty for everyone—!”

The tide became a tsunami. She rubbed her temples. Even in the cacophony, she could make out Canach yelling from the platform under her.

“Good job settling them! Try telling them they’ve won a million gold or that Lyssa is back and braless twenty feet that-a-way.”

“You aren’t helping.”

“What? I can’t hear you. I just wanted to let you know that I saw what you did and I’m laughing at your expense.”

 _“I said,”_ she repeated, paws to mouth, _“that you aren’t—”_

“We’ll reconvene later when they settle, I can’t quite make out— _laughing at your expense! Not with, at!”_

_“CANACH!”_

Emberthroat grasped the air and tore it, sending a mighty crack rippling over the crowd, a sonic boom in her palms.

“Back here! Sunset! Behave _responsibly!”_

The crowd muttered under her, ‘yes sir’ from the charr and ‘yes ma’am’ from everyone else. Emberthroat, satisfied she wouldn’t be made a fool of, attended to the minutiae of her work. Come nightfall the troops filed in with dignified, military poise, and having killed a dragon went insane.

After breaking up her fifth fight in an hour Emberthroat opted instead to scoot away and pretend she didn’t see anything. She found herself near the sylvari, mostly choosing to mingle amongst themselves. The mood was uneasy.

Caithe swirled her glass. She had nursed the same drink for three hours. “It had to be done. Mordremoth is— _was—_ an abomination. But, still, some part of me deep, deep down, feels… ‘Troubled’ is too strong a word. But it’s strange, to kill your maker. I feel relieved. And I feel strange.”

“I suppose it is unusual, yes,” said Canach, “but the Commander raved about what fun it was and you just _know_ how I get with peer pressure.”

Caithe rolled her eyes. She passed Emberthroat on her way out. She looked like she wanted to say something. Emberthroat, too exhausted to cause a scene, let her leave. Canach flagged her down.

“Commander! I saw that blood splatter in the chamber over, you’ve been a busy bee. Another fight?”

“Yeah. I think I might go. I’m not feeling well.”

“Sick?”

“I guess.”

“You should relax. Let your… Whatever it is you call it. Mane. Let your mane down.”

“What if there’s trouble?”

“Then ‘trouble’ picked a fine time to arrive. Thousands of drunk, furious, _uncomfortably_ amorous soldiers are notoriously easy pickings, once you dodge their advances, martial or... What ‘trouble’ are you afraid of?”

The thought that someone, someone who knew her, really knew her, might see the mistakes she made. The ignominy of making eye contact with that someone and having to explain to them that a clerical error four months ago had killed the love of their life. A decision made in haste. The indignity of dying mundanely in one of the greatest conflicts in the planet’s history. Thirty-six hour days and cold rations swallowing her saliva before she could. Hopes and thoughts and men and women turned to mulch.

Bodybags heaped like apples under relentlessly fruiting trees.

She glanced up at the dance floor. Drinking, hooting, weeping, orgiastic relief. Music loud enough to make her head spin. Nobody was looking at her.

It could be any one of them. She was sure of it. She knew, rationally, that she shouldn’t be. But she was.

“I’m not sure I should be here,” she admitted.

Canach put all his weight on the other foot. She counted three new stipules on his neck. “Did you hit your head? You just killed Mordremoth.”

“Yes, but, it doesn’t feel… How can you find it in yourself to celebrate?”

It was an earnest question, she made a point to prick her ears way, way up, but Canach took it as a jibe. “Because it’s over? I’m sorry, did nobody tell you?”

“So many people died,” she said, quietly. “So, so many people died.”

“Yes,” he said bluntly. “And it’s horrific. But we didn’t. Snack? I saw what you did to the flatbread.”

She shook her head. “You wouldn’t understand,” she said, putting as much warmth in it as she could muster.

“No. I don’t,” he said, aware of the toll the campaign had taken, his own debts paid reluctantly. “But don’t I sound convincing?”

“You do,” she admitted.

“Did you think you could wage a war without casualties?”

“No. I thought I could do it competently.”

“You _killed_ the dragon. That’s your idea of ‘incompetent’? What’s ‘competent’, splitting Jormag in half with an elbow-drop?”

Emberthroat found herself smiling. “No.”

“Look, I know your people are fond of arming themselves fresh out of the womb and _slopping_ onto the battlefield—”

“I think the thing I’ll miss most, Canach, is your sensitivity.”

“— But ease off. You did it. You won. It’s over. Stop slopping for five minutes.”

She looked out into the night. “Is it ever truly ov—?”

“Don’t do that,” said Canach, flat. “Don’t do that, don’t have a moment when I’m trying to enjoy my fruit puff. These are hardened troops. They understand what you did and they’re grateful.” Canach snorted. “‘Yes, I _did_ see my commander murder another dragon and yes, I _did_ survive the single greatest threat to the planet under her guidance. But then I saw her eat a tiny cheese snack at the afterparty and it’s like the respect flew out of me’.”

“Charr can’t eat cheese,” she pointed out.

“Thank you for sharing, I’d hate for the absurd hypothetical you’re labouring under to be unrealistic. Look, I only have a limited amount of time before I’m under the fleshy thumb of that awful woman and her court of simpering imbeciles and I won’t have you spoil it for me with your first class party-pooping.”

“But what if—”

“Yes, ‘if’, not ‘when’, ‘if’, now don’t you have the biggest party on the continent to enjoy? I’m sure there’s an unattended platter you can utterly obliterate.”

His mood darkened. Emberthroat could ask but doubted he would tell her anything beyond what he wanted to say.

“I don’t understand the tolls of high-command. Just as you could never imagine what it was like to be a sylvari here.”

“Not for a moment. My thoughts, even at their bleakest, are my own.”

“A toast, then, to our ignorance. Let’s hope we remain blissfully unaware of each other.”

He raised his glass. She did the same, meeting it. “Canach?”

He rolled his eyes. He took a step away, making eyes at the gambling tent. “What is it now? I should charge by the hour.”

“Thank you,” she said, sincerely. “You’re a good friend.”

He moved to respond with something just as touching. He caught himself and scrunched up his face. “Oh no, don’t do that.”

She laughed, shooing him away with her paw. She found her place at the edge of the throng once again, leaning on the bannister, broken now and then from her thoughts by soldiers. Thanking her. All thanking her. She’d see something in their eyes, but thanking her.

It was all too… Official.

She needed company. A friend.

Caithe needed time to process, Canach needed time to process the coin he was undoubtedly swindling, Emberthroat could _not_ impose herself on Kas and Jory, Braham was in no fit state and Rox was keeping him company, which really only left...

She weighed up her options.

Well…

She certainly wouldn’t be _imposing._ If he wanted to be left to brood his subtle signal would be opening his mouth and saying ‘leave me to brood’.

He was easy to find. A dark mass of armour on the opposite end of the raised platform, his neck cresting in a red cockscomb. If he _was_ going to chase her away she could at least find some fun in tormenting him before she left.

Emberthroat slinked to the boundary between the balcony and the inner chamber, silently sinking on all fours. She crept forward, step by step. She coiled her body, ready to strike.

“Don’t you think we’re a little too old to be playing games, boss?” said Rytlock.

Her muscles flopped uselessly mid-leap, sending her drifting across the floor. She rose, dejected, his head coming to her chin. “How did you do that?”

He shrugged. “Don’t take it personally. If I weren’t me, you would have got the jump. But I am, so ya didn’t.”

“It’s amazing what a blindfold can do for your other senses.”

“Sure, sure. You smell like spicy food and you’re upwind.”

“Ah...”

“The whole time, yeah.”

Emberthroat pulled a dried pocket raptor from her satchel, grazing his palm with it. His ears flicked and he took it, biting off the head.

“Thanks,” he said. “Hit the buffet, huh?

“Like a bomb. What are you doing out here?”

Rytlock nodded, chewing with his mouth open like the raptor would get up and bolt away if he gave it time. “Just getting some air.”

“Ew.”

He swallowed and thumped his chest. Rytlock nodded horns at the inner chamber.

“— Had some fun but the dancefloor’s swamped with frogs. Hate to reward their hospitality by stepping on one.”

“They kick you out of the open bar yet?”

He looked sheepish. Emberthroat rolled her eyes.

“I’ll smuggle you something. What do you want? Whisky? Gin? Pink cosmo? Beer?”

“I already checked,” he said, bitterly. “They don’t do cosmos.” Rytlock pulled a wine-bottle from the air, corked with wadded-up paper and string, a scrawled label in a hylek script. Before she could read it the bottle vanished in a wisp of smoke. “But my recent career-change comes with a few benefits.”

“I see you’ve had your powers for only a few months and are already abusing them for your own gain.”

“‘Abuse’ is seedy. ‘Squander’.”

“Magic is not a toy and it pains me to see you abuse—”

“‘Squander’.”

“— It.”

“So you don’t want any.”

Emberthroat harrumphed, crossing her arms. “... I never said that.”

Rytlock shook his head, smiling. He favoured one side over the other, she noticed, trailing her eyes over his sharp teeth.

“Beautiful night,” she said.

“It really is. Damn, that air. When the place doesn’t stink like, y’know, soot, corpses, shit, rot—”

“The usual.”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “I’m not gonna miss it. But if anyone asks I think I could say, yeah, it was…”

“‘Something’,” she offered, knowing exactly what he meant.

“I spent so long trying to hold it together, stay alive, that I never took the time to… Take it all in.” He took in a deep, deep breath and exhaled. Rytlock lifted his blindfold to peer at the jungle. Emberthroat leaned to sneak a glance at his eyes but moved too late. “All this nature. This… Simplicity. Makes you think about what’s important, y’know?”

“Yeah.”

Emberthroat sipped her drink.

“It’s awful,” she said.

“I hate it here.”

“I _hate_ it here.”

“I hate this place,” he spat. “I can’t wait to get home and never think about this jungle ever again. I miss the smog. All this nature ain’t good for me.”

“What I wouldn’t give to huff the tail-pipe of a tank right now…”

Rytlock let out a gravelly sigh, hard enough to put his voice in it. Emberthroat jolted, scratching her neck. The overgrown fronds of the jungle lay glossy in the moon, propped up oil slicks. A tiny, tiny part of home, like the part stood next to her.

Her last drink was wearing off and the threadbare start of a hangover wound from horn to horn. “I’m gonna go for a walk.”

“Alone? In the Maguuma jungle?”

She stopped at the stairs that wound around the tree, from the canopy to the jungle floor. “Worked out so far.”

“‘Spose it has,” Rytlock conceded.

“Feel free to come. I’m going to admire the beautiful view. You are welcome to… Be blind and hear me enjoy it.”

“Wow,” he deadpanned. “What an offer.”

She left him there with a wave, neither shooing him away nor implying he should come. Emberthroat, smirking, was two loops down the spiral stair when she felt his heavy footfalls ripple down the vine. She reached the bottom and waited patiently, leaning on the tree.

“How do you navigate stairs blindfolded?”

He reached the bottom, his weight shattering branches underfoot. “Same way I do when I’m looking. They’re stairs. They’re the same shape whether I’m lookin’ at them or not.”

They stood at the foot of the tree, underneath the beating heart of the drum. Emberthroat felt it in her paws, her pelvis, her marrow. The stairs split off into two paths, both well-lit and occupied with partying troops. Talking, tucking their head to their knees to ward off sickness and, in one case, drunkenly groping against a tree.

“Those two are getting… Acquainted.”

“Polite way to put ‘screwing’,” he said.

“I don’t think they’re there yet, but give them two minutes... I mean, a charr and a sylvari _?”_

“Whatever,” he said, waving her off. “Takes all kinds.”

“I don’t get it,” she admitted. “I just don’t see the appeal. Where are the claws? The fangs? Without fur, they seem so naked.”

“I dunno,” he mused, with an air of authority she guessed he didn’t mean to project, “I think it comes down to the person.”

She looked him up and down, smug. He pretended not to see. “Say, Brimstone, you ever…?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” he said, feigning ignorance.

She looked again to see the sylvari, a petite woman, doing her best to pin her partner to the tree and failing. The charr acquiesced, a large, tiger-striped male, ‘hurled’ back. Emberthroat heard drunken giggling.

“Your poorly-hidden personal life aside, they could at least find somewhere secluded.”

Rytlock snorted. “Since when do you care about that stuff?”

Since she was stuck watching this happy, drunken pair paw at each other.

“The Pact is a wide tent, Brimstone. Gotta account for all sensibilities.”

He snorted again. “Yeah. _Sure.”_

“What are you implying?”

“That it’s been too long since someone bent you over—”

She tried, fruitlessly, to cut him off with a glare. When that failed she resorted to barking his name.

“— We’ve gotta get you drilled. Want me to put my feelers out? I bet I can land you someone by the end of the night. Maybe even the hour.”

“‘Drilled’? I’m the _Pact Commander_ , not an oil reserve.”

“That wasn’t a ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Seriously, time me.”

“Are we walking or are you grilling me on my sex life?”

“I multitask. It’s a good quality.”

Emberthroat growled. She picked a direction and walked, off the path and into the dark of the underbrush.

“Still waiting on that answer,” he called, following.

Emberthroat subtly shifted her shoulders and twitched her claw to unsettle the ground under his feet and trip him. He stepped over the trap. Something he wouldn’t have seen in broad daylight. “Impressive. I can’t bring myself to be disappointed.”

Rytlock preened a little, combing his paw through his mane. She rolled her eyes, and her neck, and her whole head. “When I make an ass of myself I like to do it on my own merits,” he said.

“Are you really blind?”

“With this on? Yeah, as a dredge.”

“How do you navigate? Fight?” She cut a vine with her dagger. The darkness grew oppressive, slowly swallowing the drum and chatter. With a guttural chant, she conjured a ball of fire to hover overhead. “Do... Anything?”

She had asked this question before and already had an answer prepared for when he grunted something and refused to elaborate. Instead, he thumbed his braids, deciding on some answer he at least didn’t _mind_ sharing.

“It’s hard to explain. It’s kinda like a hunch. Call it a hundred-thousand lucky guesses. Mind that root.”

Emberthroat caught her paw on a jutting tree-root, stumbling forward. She cursed and rubbed her ankle, hopping on her other foot.

“Hundred-thousand and one lucky guesses.”

She chuffed. “I’ll be damned, that was a straight answer. You are drunk.”

“Well, enjoy it. It’s all you’re getting outta me.”

“Why?”

“The time’s not right,” he said, simply.

“When will it be?”

“When the time is right.”

“And the conditions of that are…?”

“The time being right.”

She stopped her weaving through the trees, giving him a look so withering it threatened to set fire to his fur. “Which is…?”

“‘Not now’.”

She snarled. “Ugh, whatever,” she said with a wave. “It’s your head and your business. So long as it doesn’t affect me it’ll remain your business.”

He nodded, ears twitching up. She wondered how long Rox pecked at him for answers. “It won’t, Commander,” he promised. “You’ve got enough on your plate.”

“If it gets too much, why not just take the thing off? A focus that distracts you defeats the point, Brimstone.”

“You ever had a migraine, Commander?”

“I have.”

“You ever had a migraine and had a lot going on? People coming and going, stuff to do.”

“Yes, I have.”

He drew Sohothin and hacked a tendril of vines before she could burn it away. He held it, swinging it a few times to feel its weight as if it were new to him, then sheathed it again.

“You ever had a migraine and the screamin’ dead thumbing the folds of your brain like a cub’s flipbook?”

“Point made,” she said. “Where are we going, anyway?”

“I’m following you. I figured you had a place in mind.”

“I was following you.”

Emberthroat looked at Rytlock. Rytlock blindedfolded at Emberthroat. They puffed out their chests, put on their best aura of command and strode confidently in opposite directions.

They met in the middle, sheepish and no further forward.

Emberthroat slipped her paw from her glove and pressed her palm to a nearby tree. “We’re hardly lost, but…”

“Just our luck to kill the dragon _then_ die in the jungle.” They walked again. “You’re on marking duty.”

Emberthroat let her hand brush against another tree, another signpost. “I’m already doing it.”

“I know. Just figured we’d have better luck following the stench of soot and burning hair.”

She hoped he couldn’t see her smile. “You’re a jackass.”

His tone said that yes, he could. “Just being honest.”

“Too honest for a charr in corpse-dumping territory.”

“Finally making a move for tribune? Sheesh, took you long enough.”

They walked in companionable silence. As the moon bathed comfortably in the sky they came to a clearing. Emberthroat jerked out her arm, stopping him.

“Wait,” she said.

She tentatively reached out with her paw. The overgrowth fell away, tumbling down a sheer cliff.

Rytlock leaned over the edge and spat.

“That’s a big drop,” he said.

“It’s a cliff, Brimstone.”

She kicked a pebble off the side. She heard the distant ‘clack’ five seconds later.

“Five by five by sixteen, that’s—”

“Three hundred.”

“— Four hundred feet straight down,” she said. “Stick to swinging the sword. That’s a big drop. Wanna see me do a handstand?”

“On the edge? Drunk? Sure.”

“Wow. I was kidding.”

He dusted off his paws and rolled his neck. “Hold Sohothin.”

She gripped him by the sword belt and dragged him back ten feet, open-palm shoving him on the ground and putting on the tone she used to scare the shit out of the greenies. _“We’re settling here.”_

Rytlock silently conceded, nodding. He sat up, clearing his throat.

“What’s got into you?” she scoffed.

“I… Uh, nothing. Yeah, here’s fine.”

He pulled the bottle of wine from the air, waggling it in front of her like he was jingling keys.

“Huh. Thanks,” she said, taking it and swigging. “Wine my ass, goes down like spirits. I’m gonna have a hell of a hangover tomorrow. In five minutes, even, ugh, my head...”

“Not yet. Hair of the charr that mauled you, right?”

“If I drink now I’ll delay the inevitable and tomorrow’s hangover will be even worse.”

“Yeah,” he said, “but it fixes it for now. Seems like an easy pick in my book.”

She raised her brows. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“... You aren’t kidding, are you? I’ll feel worse tomorrow.”

“But you’ll feel better now,” he said, slowly, taking a pull.

“You know what? Gimme the damn bottle before I act responsibly.”

“You deserve it.”

“Deserve what?”

“A night off. Some good company, good meal, good hard screw. Normal shit.”

It felt nice. The affirmation. It was nice from Canach too, but...

“It is kinda hard to relax,” she admitted.

“Even now?”

“A little.”

“Pro’ly ‘cause you looked at your list of careers and put ‘the most stressful job in history’ in the little blank space.”

“Yeah. Can’t imagine that helps.” She glumly handled her mane. She desperately needed a cut. “Think I’m going grey.”

Rytlock nodded, his own locks overgrown and shaggy. His scruff-braids were getting longer and longer. “Take a load off. You take on any more pressure and you’re gonna pop like a skewered bladder. You’re Blood! Drink too much. Overeat ‘til you get heartburn so bad you puke. Make a sculpture out of lava. Run naked through the forest. Whatever you feel like. When we pack up and head home there’s gonna be a lot of bullshit to trawl through so for tonight, keep it simple. Don’t worry about the big stuff. That’ll be there when the fun’s over. Stick to ‘this feel good?’ Do it if it does. Simple.”

It occurred to her that she hadn’t heard anything like that in years.

And it occurred to her to miss it.

“Like robbing a bar, Brimstone?”

“Petty crime? Nah. Getting good enough at what I do to sneak all in and out of a packed bar without anyone noticing? Yeah. That feels pretty damn good.”

“Killing a dragon always feels good.”

He whistled. “Damn, Commander. If that’s your ‘good’ invite me to your next ‘great’.”

You’re already here.

Rytlock looked at her, expecting some sort of answer, as people often do in conversations.

“Yeah,” she grunted.

“You okay? Uh, shoulda checked if we can even handle this stuff before we started drinking, actually...”

“We’re hardly lightweights, Brimstone.”

“Yeah, I don’t think a liver of iron is gonna help us if we’re allergic to frog-brew and choke to death on our own puke and hair.”

They looked at the bottle.

“We’re already in too deep,” she shrugged.

“My thoughts exactly. Least if we die it’s not to pocket-raptors. Or giant, walking mushrooms. They kept this in ice, y’know.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, heard it takes the edge off. Pity. A real shame. A nice beverage and no way to cool it. What a waste. A real, real, real—”

“Are you trying to guilt me into using my powers _—_ harness the primordial elements themselves _—_ to _cool your wine?”_

Rytlock feigned a little gasp. “Commander! There you are. I was just talking to myself and I catch you listening in. You’re gonna break my soft little heart, accusing me of things like that.”

“That, tribune, would be the most _egregious_ misuse of Citadel training I have ever heard and I have heard a lot of them.”

“All due respect, Commander,” he said, “you’re a spellcaster. I’m willing to bet that training wasn’t very good.”

“... Alright, fine, give it here.”

Rytlock handed the bottle over, a lopsided smile on his face. “Anyone ever tell you you’ve got a kind soul?”

Emberthroat fussed with the bottle. She shoved it between her arm and her torso, channelling the cold with rhythmic breathing. “Anyone ever beat you to death with a wine bottle?”

“Night’s young.”

She shook her head, smiling. They sat in comfortable silence. She felt the start of a purr but suppressed it. Rytlock draped his arm over his knee.

“You have something on your mind,” she said, forcing it to the front before he could chicken out.

“Yeah,” he grunted.

The jungle thrummed, insects and creaking trees forming the steady thump of its heart.

“That’s an invitation to elaborate, tribune.”

“Assumed so.”

Cicadas, frogs, the whipping of branches on trees.

“You don’t make things easy, do you?”

“It’s a habit.”

The ripples of a gigantic lake of crickets. The jungle came alive in the dark.

“Killing one dragon,” he said, “that’s a fluke. But killing two…”

She couldn’t see his eyes but could tell they were glittering from the big, stupid grin on his face.

“That’s a pattern.”

“And killing three...?”

He put his paws up. “That’s getting ahead of ourselves,” he said.

“You know, Brimstone, for a second I thought you looked happy.”

“Then you should get your eyes checked, Commander. You got a torch up?”

“Yeah.”

“Call it off.”

She took the fire overhead between her hands and crushed it flat, dusting off the embers. The pair were thrown into the night; part of the forest, not spectators to it.

“Alright, it’s gone.”

“How dark is it?”

“It’s the middle of the night, Rytlock.”

“I know it is,” he rumbled. “But you know what Maguuma is like. Half the place is lit up in some freaky, chemiluminescent… Things. Is it dark or what?”

She reared back and laughed, hand on her gut. Rytlock jolted but, becoming used to the sound, chuckled himself. “You remembered ‘chemiluminescent’ but forgot the word ‘ _light’?”_

Rytlock snapped his fingers. “That was the word.”

“Good to see your time at the Priory didn’t rub off on you at all.”

“Says the spy that can’t sneak up on a blind guy.”

She rolled her eyes. Emberthroat made a point of gently applauding. “Yes, yes. I think, Rytlock, that it’s sufficiently dark.”

“How come it’s ‘Brimstone’ ‘til I ask a stupid question? I don’t do that to you.”

“Because I don’t ask stupid questions, _Rytlock.”_

“Says you, _Jozra.”_

Her hackles raised a moment. The tension dissipated with a pop.

“Yeah,” she laughed. She pressed her snout to his cheek, running her tongue over a scar. “Alright. Yeah, you’ve more than earned it.”

Rytlock huffed, leaning in to let her groom him. “We left Ascalon months ago and all the charr out either never cared or are past the point of giving a shit. What’s Scaldgore gonna do, hop up outta that shallow grave and ask for it back?”

She buried her face in him. She held it there a moment too long, just over the threshold for ‘friend’ and withdrew. He gripped her snout, gently yanked her forward and repaid the favour. “Ease up, that tickles. And thank you again, for that.”

He let go. Emberthroat was torn between letting him or demanding he continue. “Ah, don’t thank me. It was your beef and you did all the legwork. I just like stabbin’ guys.”

“I’m glad you’re on my side.”

“No matter what,” he said. She didn’t know if he meant that to be touching. She doubted it. She was touched nonetheless. “Why not change the name? Not your fault you’re named for some fundamentalist nutjob.”

“I think the fahrar took enough from me, Rytlock.”

“I… Yeah,” he said, glumly. He leaned back, kicked one leg over the other and rested on his elbows. “Yeah...”

“My ‘bandmates called me Joz. When it was just us.”

“They knew?”

“Hard for ‘em not to. They didn’t care. I wasn’t Jozrin’s kit. Just Joz. It was never the cubs. Always the adults. Always the ones you’d hope knew better.”

Rytlock snorted derisively. “Yeah, sure, other cubs are always perfect little darlings…”

“Maybe not,” she shrugged, “but they were okay with me. I think I scared them. With, y’know…”

She waggled her paw over her face.

“‘Course, then they grow up, put a little muscle on, get set in their ways…”

“Your first mistake was thinking people grow brains when they get older. How’d that faith work out?”

“Not too shabby,” she admitted. “I ended up with a friend like you.”

Rytlock mimed gagging. That stupid smile was back again, even when it wasn’t. She could tell from his muzzle that he was forcing it down.

“By the way…”

“If you start reciting poems and weaving friendship bracelets,” he said, “I’m gonna hurl and I’m gonna make a point to paint you like a wall.”

“I was just gonna say that, uh… Yeah, you can. If you want.”

“Hurl?”

“Think, dipshit.”

“Oh. Oh...”

He scratched his mane. She marvelled with the ease with which he said it, spooling the syllables through his lips and stitching her, seam by gossamer seam, to the earth.

“Thanks… Thanks, Joz.”

She might never move from that spot again and she would be glad.

“I know that kind of thing means a lot,” he continued. “Not to get all… Soft and squishy about it, ugh. Forget I said anything.”

“I don’t think anyone could confuse you for a sap, Rytlock.”

“I dunno,” he joked, “the way I’ve been carrying on around you, someone might. Come on, the Pact Commander and her aide-de-camp strutting off to drink fine wine under the stars? People’ll talk...”

“The wine is terrible.”

“Two scuzzy cats stealing the booze and getting shitfaced under a tree like a couple greenies sneaking out of camp. There? You happy?”

“Rarely.”

Rytlock put a supportive claw on her shoulder. “Buck up. I’m trying to party here.”

Emberthroat let out a little laugh, deep, resonant and sincere. She drooled a little and wiped it on her forearm. “Sensitive as always.”

“Figured you needed the laugh. I know I do.”

“You seem in high spirits.”

“I do, don’t I?” He lifted the bottle skyward for a moment. “To Eir ‘n Trahearne, and all the poor bastards we dumped on the jungle floor. Least it wasn’t for nothing.”

He drank.

She took the wine and did the same. “Take some time. I’ll find you in the morning.”

“Not necessary.”

“You’re allowed to be sad about it.”

“Joz?”

It still startled her. A warm judder of the heart.

“Yeah?”

Defeated. He sounded defeated. It was more a plea than a request.

“Not tonight, yeah?” Rytlock said. “Not tonight.”

“Not tonight,” she echoed. “C’mon. Let’s get plastered.”

There was that smile again. That lopsided, sharp-edged, whisky-reek smile. She couldn’t help but smile back. Fully, pulling her lips taut, divulging cragged teeth from blood-red gums. Rytlock didn’t recoil— she always anticipated a little, shock supplanted intent— in fact, he raised the other half of his lip and smiled from both sides. “Never seen you do that.”

“I smile.”

“Not like that.”

“Yeah, you’ve never had the heartwarming experience of smiling at a passing cub and making her cry _.”_

Rytlock held his chin.

“That a challenge?”

“No.”

She felt good and warm, and even without the wine imagined she would feel drunk. Her hips felt weighted, forcing her to roll on them a little, to readjust under the grass and inelegantly shove her robe back under her tail. Lust?

She looked him up and down, the booze sanding off his imperfections. Yeah. Yeah, she’d ride that into battle. Maybe even back, too.

“Might be the booze talking, but…”

Rytlock spoke with the frankness she appreciated. Looking didn’t mean much of anything to charr.

Not much did.

“Ogling?”

“Damn straight,” she said. ”Nice legs.”

“The back’s even better. So I’ve heard. Still dark?”

“No. It’s the middle of the day. You’ve been in a coma for years. Please. Wake up.”

“No, seriously, is it still dark?”

Her scoff was a sufficient answer. He unfurled the fabric from around his eyes and, wincing, turned to face her.

His eyes were a lush, shining green. She recalled them being… Blue? Brown? But not green.

… _Glowing?_

Emberthroat put her paw by his face. They were glowing!

“That’s creepy,” she said.

“Tell me about it,” he replied.

She marvelled some more. Finally, she left him alone, sitting back.

And she saw how he looked at her.

Sturdy, dependable, always-there Rytlock. A more permanent fixture in her life than even herself some days. Trained in the same way, raised in the same way, ruthless in the same way. Who could review her performance and pinpoint every single mistake she had ever made, every careless call, every high-risk high-reward situation that didn’t pan out. Wielding hindsight like his battered pistol; picking a direction, firing and hitting something she regretted.

But he wouldn’t. He got that she couldn’t wage a perfect war. Friends die or everyone dies. The former only delays the latter. And before she was the Commander, just ‘the Commander’, she was Emberthroat.

His centurion.

His friend.

Rytlock Brimstone.

Her tribune.

Her friend.

It wasn’t quite lust.

It was familiar, too.

Her heart sank.

“Alright, alright,” he rumbled, shifting under her gaze. “Try not to fall in love.”

_Shit._

She drank. Her stomach rolled in her ribs, her heart thumped to get out. “You’ve been tribune too long. Your ego is out of control.”

“I was a certified smug prick even when I was a scrapper. How d’you think I made tribune in the first place?”

“Murder, Rytlock. You _murdered_ people.”

He shrugged. “If something works…”

_Shit shit shit._

“What’s up with you?”

“I’m a little overwhelmed,” she admitted.

“Damn right you are! You’ve killed two dragons, I think you’ve earned that right.”

“No, that’s not what…” She pinched her brow. “Ugh, I don’t know. Maybe it’s that. It’s probably that.”

He huffed. “Well, Commander, anytime I ask myself a question and one of the answers is ‘murdered a dragon’, I figure that’s it.”

“Yeah… I… Yeah. You’re right.”

“Usually am.”

She snorted with laughter.

“Wasn’t joking.”

She laughed harder.

Without the blindfold, she could enjoy the fullness of his scowl. He caught her looking again and rolled his eyes. “Fine. Only ‘cause it’s you. And I’m only gonna do this once, so get your looks in.” He gently prised his eyelids open, rolling up his pupil. Blood vessels, in sprawling arms, reached to link across his eye, locking in a glittering mist that fretted like the innards of a snowglobe. A slip of fog coalesced, taking shelter under his slit-pupil to stare back at her as if it could regard her with the same intelligent scrutiny.

“Your eye _looked_ at me!”

It occurred to her how close they were. He smelled of strong alcohol and honeyed meat.

“Yeah,” he said very, very slowly. When he spoke she could taste him on the air. “They do that. What are we covering next? Letters? Numbers?”

She swatted his head with her paw. He reeled and swatted back.

“As I was _saying,_ ” Rytlock muttered, “I figure the creepy light-show will settle when I get things totally under control.” He tapped the base of his neck. “Been practising. Meditating. Quiets ‘em.”

“The voices?”

“Yup.”

“They’re talking right now?”

“Always.”

“... What are they saying?”

“I’m stuck with some Ascalonian palace guard so I think I’m gonna spare you. Creepy, right? Rox got a glimpse when I scratched an itch and damn near jumped six feet. Thought I’d sent her off the cliff.”

“Who’s in there?”

“You aren’t scoping out a buffet, Commander.”

“You must have _someone_ notable rattling around in that head. It’s not like you’re putting the space to use.”

He laughed again. Warm, deep and burbling, like the split-necks of rabbits she thrashed with her teeth. The subtle thrill of pleasant mundanity. “Ventari swings by sometimes. Not often, but sometimes.”

“That Ventari? The sylvari’s Ventari?”

“Yeah.”

“So it’s a sylvari Ventari party?”

Rytlock gently pulled the bottle of wine from her claws. “Alright, maybe you’ve had enough of that…”

“Hardly!”

Rytlock sighed, head lolling a little. Emberthroat leveraged her height and thumped her head on his, resting there in the way she learned _not_ to do with non-charr.

“Oh,” he said. “Hey.”

“Hey,” she replied. “You’re a good pillow for a meathead.”

“You’re a good hat for a bone-bag.”

“‘Bone-bag’,” she harrumphed, “you make me sound ugly.”

“You _are_ ugly,” he said, “but in a good way. Gives you character.”

“Aren’t you a charmer,” she muttered.

“Nah, nah. You don’t get where I’m coming from. Okay, so… Bear with me here.”

“I haven’t smacked your head off. I’m bearing.”

“You aren’t the prettiest charr to ever walk the Citadel. You don’t have to be. You’re tall, you’re mean, you’re stubborn and you’re ugly. That ain’t a bad thing.”

“And this makes me feel better…?”

Rytlock threw his paws up. “‘Cause that’s you! You’re just you. Good ‘n bad. You. Nobody else. You’re just… You. I like that.”

She scoffed, looking around them to see if anyone had put him up to this. “Glad to see I’ve earned your illustrious approval, tribune, despite my _unlovable deformity._ I’m sure looking at my face is a struggle.”

Rytlock let loose a very, very quiet, “whuh-oh.”

“Yeah. ‘Whuh-oh’.”

“You dense— ugh— that’s not what I’m saying.”

“Dense? Dense? Stupid _and_ ugly? What in the hell is the matter with you?”

He ran his claw over his brows and down his snout. “Look, Commander, I’m real bad at these things. It’s not what I meant.”

“Then what the hell are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” he said, “that my opinion doesn’t count for shit, and neither does anyone else’s. You’re you. _You_ have got a lot to like.”

She grasped the point he was clumsily putting across, extending his paw in tentative affirmation of their bond, tripping and breaking her nose. Emberthroat let a little amusement creep into her voice, still yelling. “So your opinion doesn’t count for shit?”

“Hell no!”

“But you’re _still_ willing to dig in and scream about it?”

“I…” She saw him force down a smile. Rytlock’s voice wavered but he bit his lip and got it out, maintaining his ferocity. He crossed his arms. “Yeah, I guess I am!”

Emberthroat crossed her arms too. “Well, so am I!”

“Clearly!”

They waited to see who cracked first. Rytlock acquiesced. He groomed her muzzle. “Would you believe me if I say my compliments usually go a lot better?”

“No.”

“Yeah… Yeah, I can’t blame you. Not that your looks are the ‘bad’. They’re just...”

He let out a weighty sigh. She could feel him groping for words.

“They’re just you.”

“If that isn’t,” she said, playfully, “what is—?”

“Well,” said Rytlock immediately, “you’ve got a bad habit of getting riled about something ‘til you freak out and explode. You pick it up, squeeze it into a tight little ball, then shove it down just to spit it up later. You got the bad kind of bad temper. Oh, you don’t leave camp to bring up hairballs. You chew your claws. Hide food. You belch a lot. Listening to you eat is like listening to someone punch mud. Did you eat all the flatbread?”

 _“_ Scorch me, did you have a list ready? I shouldn’t have asked,” she muttered. “Fine, then what’s good?”

“You fish for compliments.”

“That’s not good.”

“Wasn’t done with the ‘bad’.”

“Hmph.”

“Oh,” he continued, “and you grew a big, sappy, gooey heart.”

“Skin me raw and call me a mouse, how long is the ‘bad’?”

“No, it’s good.”

The giant crickets thrummed. The trees creaked like bridge-ropes.

“Uh,” he said, “in moderation. None of that maudlin tree-children shit. Every once in a while. Figured if you were really, _really_ old-school Blood the Pact would be a hell of a lot less Pact-y. In spirit and in body, considering we’d all be fish-food for some undead dragon and I wouldn’t have seen Logan, the salad, the opinionated little rat, ‘cause I’m too damn stubborn so no matter how much I...”

Whatever fueled his honesty ran dry.

Emberthroat looked down at him. “You… Said what you needed to in Orr.”

“I didn’t. I think I grunted something and waved you off. That ain’t fair. So I’ll say it now. I’ll keep it simple before I screw up and call you something I don’t mean.”

His eyes scanned as if recalling and editing some pre-planned speech. He shook his head and took a long pull of wine, spluttering out his thoughts at the end like a cough.

 _“Thank_ you.”

He held her gaze. She dragged it back, looking away. This was wonderful. She was going to be sick.

“You’re too honest.”

“That a good or bad thing?”

“I haven’t decided. Rytlock?”

He seemed so subtle without the blindfold. She laughed a little. Emberthroat would never peg Rytlock as ‘subtle’.

“Yeah?”

“Can you... Say my name again?”

His ears flicked. He shrugged.

“Joz—”

Emberthroat gripped the fur of his neck like she wanted to tear it off and yanked him into a deep, hard kiss.

Hesitation.

… Terror?

She couldn’t see into his head. It might be terror.

She let go, already throwing out apologies. Damn it. Fuck.

“Wait,” Rytlock said, grabbing her wrist. “wait, wait. Hold up.”

He looked at the little strip of cloth in his hand. His voice was barely audible.

“Man,” he chuckled, “I gotta take this off more often…”

He loosened his grip on her paw and rubbed his thumb over where he held too tight.

“I’m not good with these things, but I just wanted to say...”

Dozens of little microexpressions rendered in perfect clarity.

Rytlock’s expression hardened.

“... Ah, screw it.”

He gripped her shoulders and tugged her down to meet him, running his teeth along her neck, butting his horns to hers, cramming his hand up her skirt. He felt her teeth on his lips when she smiled.

“This feel good?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I reckon it does.”

Emberthroat gripped him over his loincloth _._ “This?”

“Dunno,” he leered. “You should do it again ‘n see.”

She did. He grunted in her ear, hard under her palm.

“Sorry f—”

“Little harder.”

She complied, groping. His breath hitched.

“Yeah, like that. Fuck.”

“I was just saying—”

“You do that and expect a conversation you’ve got another thing coming,” he grunted. “We talk after.”

“After what?”

He parted her legs. He fumbled with the buckles on his thighs, sheets of plate-armour tumbling away.

“Guess.”

Rytlock scrambled on top of her. Emberthroat greeted him, throwing her arms out, wrapping her legs around his waist, shoved back a foot from the force. Their movements grew hungrier, their motions more frantic.

“Wait,” she blustered, “wait, wait.”

She could barely make out his figure in the waning moonlight, save for two shining, green-gold eyes.

“I’m out of practice,” she admitted, not saying what she wanted to say.

“Yeah, the Mists don’t have a whole lot of options either. Relax. We’re just blowing off some steam.”

Her heart sank. She should tell him. He’d get it. He always got it.

Emberthroat leaned in and gave him a small kiss on the cheek, holding her head there, breathing him in. It was easy. She couldn’t bear to be in love, so she wasn’t.

“Yeah,” she purled. “Blowing off steam.”

His claws moved in languid exploration. A savoured meal after months of nothing.

The statement tumbled out of her like teeth in a dream, a memory.

“I haven’t done this since he died,” she blurted.

His hands remained where they were. Still except for their breathing, posing for a painting. He withdrew. Fumbling with the buckles again.

“C’mon,” he said. “I’ll walk you back. We can go dancing, get something to eat.”

“I want this.”

“Look, if you’ve got some stuff to work out, I get it. Really. But I’m not gonna be a stand-in for anyone else. Even for a night.”

“You’re nothing alike. You’re you.”

He chuffed. “Last I checked.”

Her voice, her deep, loud voice, was thin. A rumble in her throat, like a cough.

“I like you, Rytlock,” she said, the words true and inadequate.

The statement teetered precariously on his awareness, as liable to tip one way as it was the other. His expression, what she could see of it, didn’t give anything away. But he climbed on again, parting her legs. Rytlock pressed the fat of his paw-pad to her neck, gently, she wouldn’t have known if her eyes were shut. The corner of his mouth upturned in a bittersweet smile and burnt away. “You’re warm. Really, really warm.”

“Shaman thing,” she said. “We run a little hotter than most.”

“I know,” he replied.

“How?”

“I’ll tell you after.”

“Another thing for tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” he said. He shifted on his knee, on the leg he never led with. “I guess. Do me a favour and call it a few hundred tomorrows.”

She supposed she couldn’t resent his secrets, given how she hoarded hers. “Don’t give me a number. I’ll hold you to it,” she said, half-joking.

Rytlock chuckled. He shed his carapace of armour, then the undershirt. His wide, strong body held the tension of a man who hoped she wouldn’t continue their conversation. When Rytlock mapped her pubis with his fingers she spoke again.

“Soldier,” she said, mustering all the indignation she could manage, “are you coming on to me?”

He grasped the rope she threw him and clung with both paws. “Now what would give you that idea? You’re getting full of yourself.”

The first finger, claw retracted, slipped inside her.

“‘You’re getting full of yourself’…?”

“Sir,” he added, pushing in another. He worked her easily in confident motions. He’d do something, glance up and adjust. Emberthroat fell into the great black tide of the sky, eyes open, mouth agape.

“Harder, harder... There…”

Her ears twitched. An animal in a nearby shrub, jerking back and retreating to its den. She’d wrench a breath from the air and sink under again. To her pleasant surprise she crested the wave, soaked-through and snarling his name.

Rytlock looked smug. Great. Now she’d have to deal with that. Self-satisfied bastard. She adored him.

“Havin’ fun?”

“No,” she lied, hitting the ground like she’d been dropped.

“Sure, sure…”

Emberthroat made an undignified, choke-snorting noise when she felt his tongue. She burned when Rytlock laughed, kicking him when he tried to disguise it by burying his mouth in the thicker fur of her thighs and cackling into that. Deep, low peals, the kick of a faulty engine. She broke, threading her claw through his hair and laughing so hard she wheezed like a poorly played accordion. She relented only when it became physically painful to continue. She found her composure, her terse baseline.

“Get back to work,” she said, flat.

She heard the tears lingering on his eyes, colouring his voice.

“You sound like a sick moa,” he replied, just as deadpan.

They lost it again. Emberthroat had been trying on and off for _years_ to make him crack, to elicit something more than an upturned lip. She forced herself to consider it a win despite her ruby-red cheeks.

“You snort when you laugh,” she said.

His bombast was gone. “Nobody will believe you if you tell ‘em...”

“If you say so.” He pulled his head from her robe. His muzzle damp, his eyes damper. He rested on the bony divot of her hip. They broke into giggles again.

“You’ve gotta stop that shit,” he protested, “I can’t laugh and stay hard.”

“I am trying to be ravished and you’re screwing ar—”

He speared her. Leg up and back a little to make it sting. Whatever curses she had came out as garbled moans. She pummelled his back with her claws and gripped the bands of muscle on his hips, attempting to drag him back and forth like a leather toy. Emberthroat handled every jolt, noted every scrape and bite, and intended to pay it back threefold.

That’s what sex was. Lust. Lust and anger. Anything else was made up, some half-cooked fantasy. It was there to be had. A break from killing. Exercise. Topping up the ever-waning supply of troops. Emberthroat wanted it to feel like that, like the drunken, _angry_ fumbles in her adolescence to the mutual resignation of the encounters of her twenties. Why take time? They all had such little time left. Death looming over them, watching their stupid, animal movements and flipping a coin.

Of all the people she had ever slept with, who was still alive?

Tybalt was different. He made love like he had nowhere else to be. Even when they did, that one time they were so late for their check-in that Valenze looked like she was going to pop. Tybalt spent five minutes trying to talk around where they were until Emberthroat just came out with—

Rytlock kissed her and she hurled herself fully into it. He smelled boozy in the best way. Not second-hand, stale alcohol. Fresh. Like a cologne, or a candle.

This was nice. Like Tybalt, kind of. But different. Way different.

They weren’t making love. But now they weren’t fucking, either.

Rytlock looked like he thought it was nice, too. And that he didn’t know what the hell was going on. But he persisted, over and over again, his neck climbing until his head was thrown back, mane piled over itself. Emberthroat watched his gullet bob, transfixed. His movements lost rhythm. When he twitched to pull away, Emberthroat grabbed his buttocks, her claws leaving welts that nipped in the hot air. Her voice was staccato, husky, her breath rattled.

“Stay,” she murmured.

Rytlock shoved her down, buried his face in the fur of her neck and let out a long, agonized croak. She blinked at how little encouragement he needed and melted into his embrace.

He slumped over her, his palms on either side of her head. The moon was back. Emberthroat saw the titillating pain on his face when she ran her claws along the scratches she made, heard him pant and whimper when she made new ones. He collapsed fully, rumbling like an engine. He licked the wounds he gave her. She made new ones until they fell asleep, heavy and content, blood on their tongues, lions gutting a gazelle until they were too full to move.

They awoke in the early hours, bleary and still half-drunk. Rytlock mumbled something, the start of some thought, and looked relieved when Emberthroat shoved him back and climbed on top. Tonight was tonight. And if it would be all she had, fine. But she had tonight.  
  


* * *

  
Two things occurred to Emberthroat. One; that Rytlock, in the deepest part of sleep, clutched her like a big, boney bed-stone, the kind they pluck out of the fire to wedge under the straw at night. Two; he was a drooler and she couldn’t get out from under him.

She creaked upwards, covering her eyes, working out the matted fur of her shoulder. She rolled into a giant, Rytlock-shaped dent in the foliage. An undercurrent of movement seeped into the jungle dirt. Frenetic activity.

It could wait.

A Pact chopper screamed overhead, moving in the direction of the extraction point. Damn. No, it couldn’t. She stood, eyes closed, mouth full of grass. The sun was brighter than it had ever been and her brain felt like a wrung-out sponge.

Something… Wasn’t right.

She felt her forehead.

“Where…?”

She fell to her knees with a thump, rooting through the foliage. Gone. She could comb for hours and not find it, even if she hadn’t sent it sailing down the cliff. She took a wide stance and summoned the barest, most juvenile flame. It singed her paws in a way she hadn’t felt since she was a cub, fire licking skin like the tongue of a dolyak. She sighed, pulling her dagger from her belt.

“Let’s hope I don’t get mauled by anything flammable,” she muttered.

She picked up her own trail, allowing herself the luxury of one eye squeezed firmly shut. She passed a platoon who looked just as hungover as she did. They gave sloppy salutes and she waved them on in just as slipshod a manner. She walked until she encountered the longest, brightest stairs in the entire world.

“Ugh…”

She braced her palm to the railing and ascended. A Priory scribe— Emberthroat remembered him from one of the encampments outside Tarir— lay asleep on the stairs. Emberthroat shook him awake with her foot. His eyes widened when he saw who stood above him but the panic fell away when they agreed, with a glance, that this was a ‘let’s not speak of this again’ kind of incident. He scuttled off. Emberthroat did not look forward to seeing herself in a mirror. She drew some water from the air and splashed her face with it, then coughed.

“Pull it together… Okay.”

Emberthroat jogged up the stairs. Canach greeted her at the top, having heard her splashing and coughing.

“Morning, Commander,” he said, not a prickle out of place. He sipped his canteen of what Emberthroat assumed was water. “I see you had a fun night.”

“Good morning, Canach. You look… Spry.”

“Cats, Commander, are supposedly renowned for their flexibility and their miraculous ability to withstand pain. Don’t you like learning? I like learning.”

“I’m aware, Canach,” she muttered. “You’re not helping.”

“I’m flattered you assume that was my intent,” he said, hand on breast. “I’ll develop an ego if you continue to fellate my good nature.”

“How is everyone?”

“Damp and hungover. I’ve seen massacres less emotionally taxing on its troops than this.”

“You?”

“Damp and remarkably chipper. Isn’t that odd? I look forward to talking at you, perhaps very quickly and loudly, _overwhelmed_ with excitement as I am. You have a head for fire and mayhem, would you care to listen to me try out some explosives? I see you’re missing your little… Extravagant doodad.”

“It’s not a doodad,” she protested. “I need it for spellwork.”

“So you can’t do magic?”

“Not safely. Not until I make another.”

“So,” said Canach, “it’s just Commander Throat?”

She snapped her fingers and singed the tips of his pauldrons. He batted the flames out with the same concern he’d show a landing fruit-fly.

“Despite your apparent fondness for setting your own men alight I thought I’d do the decent thing and inform you that the tribune asked after you. I imagine you may want to check-in and confirm you weren’t eaten whole by some carnivorous plant.”

“Thank you.”

“Maybe keep those well-wishes to yourself. You appear to need them more.”

Emberthroat grumbled away. Rytlock wasn’t hard to find. He was talking to a captain of the Vigil before he hailed Emberthroat and excused himself. Rytlock nodded at her, looking rough around the edges. His shoulders were mottled with fresh welts. The blindfold was back. “Commander,” he said, saluting.

“Brimstone,” she replied, perfectly businesslike. She leaned in. “I see you _somehow_ found time to groom,” she muttered.

“I thought I was doing you a favour,” he muttered back. “Not my fault thirty Pact choppers couldn’t wake you up. Guess you’re used to loud noises, considering how you snore.”

“Half my skull is floating in my head. It makes the fact you snore even _louder_ remarkable.”

He harrumphed and she harrumphed right back.

“Canach said you were looking for me?”

“Huh?” Rytlock cocked a brow, holding his chin. “I can’t remember saying… Yeah, I might’ve. Sorry. Head’s not really in it today.”

“I know the feeling—”

Emberthroat turned to find Canach, hands clasped behind his back, his posture easy. Rytlock nodded in greetings.

“Canach,” said Emberthroat, reaching the end of her rope, “do you need something?”

“Just checking in,” he replied, pleasantly.

“I haven’t keeled over and died in the three seconds since our last meeting.”

“Could have fooled me...”

Rytlock snickered. Emberthroat thumped him on the base of his upper-most horns. The impact punctured and lay in his hangover like a musket-shot in ballistic gel, he cursed and rubbed his scalp. “There’s Vigil packing up munitions south of the camp,” she said, ignoring him. “I’d feel a lot better with you there to supervise.”

“From the way you look I can say with some confidence that no,” replied Canach. “You wouldn’t.”

“Okay. I see. Let me rephrase this. There’s Vigil packing up munitions south of the camp. If you, Canach, don’t go, I’m going to use your bark as a scratching post.”

“Not to imply that the Pact’s best and brightest would slay the dragon only to blow themselves up shaking the wrong box like a fat-handed child on Wintersday eve but yes, I suppose they could do with an expert’s touch. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“I… Guess?”

“Yes.” Canach finally began the process of packing up. “I thought you would.”

Rytlock nodded at her. “Your mane’s a mess.”

“I know.”

Rytlock hawked into his palm and smoothed her hair down, pasting it to her back. He stood back to appraise and gave a thumbs up.

“... Thanks,” she said.

“No problem.”

“What are we looking at?”

“Arranging transport out of here in batches and figuring out who gets priority. The way I see it—”

“Get the squishies out of the way; Priory gets priority on ships out, keep some Vigil for the rearguard. Whispers are already up and out.”

“Bingo," replied Rytlock. "Thought you’d say that, so I took the liberty of starting. Seems like my _easygoing disposition_ ain’t enough to motivate some of these drunken bastards and...” Rytlock squinted at where her anchoring gem used to be. “Where’s your doodad?”

Emberthroat heard a loud, obnoxious snicker. “Canach, do you _mind?”_

“Not at all,” Canach said.

“Well, I do. I’m busy with Brimstone.”

“Far be it from me to interrupt… When you’re done, might I trouble you a moment?”

“You always trouble me.”

“Might I trouble you with deliberate, focused intent?”

“Get it out of the way.”

Canach cleared his throat. “My time in the Grove let me bear witness to goodbyes so extravagantly _mawkish_ that Snargle Goldclaw himself would weep in inadequacy. My people don’t do ‘restraint’ well.”

“I know the feeling,” replied Emberthroat.

“With that in mind, I hope you’ll allow me to indulge myself for a moment. I believe I am owed some joy after all that has happened. And, yet again, I believe I owe you…”

It wasn’t an act, exactly, but certainly a front. A playing-up of his own features. He dropped the curtain an inch.

“... A lot.”

To acknowledge his sincerity would be to ruin it. “Again,” she said, mustering some play in her voice.

“Yes, again,” he replied with a prodigious, thankful scoff. “Don’t ruin this with your showboating. It’s difficult to put my gratitude into words. And I’m bad at it so I’m not going to. Goodbye.”

Canach braced his hands behind his back and walked away, disappearing down the steps. Emberthroat waited for two minutes. Convinced he had left, she returned to Rytlock, shaking her head and left with the impression she had been given something of great esteem.

“All that and he just left.”

“He’s a pain in the ass,” Rytlock rumbled, “but I like his style. My damn head. D’you have to hit so hard?”

“Yes,” she said, smugly.

Rytlock did the same to her, thumping her head at the horns. She squawked like a moa with a broken leg, hammering her foot on the floor.

“Now we’re even.”

She couldn’t see but she knew, categorically, that he was looking somewhere else.

 _“So…_ ” he said, a dozen other words hidden behind it.

The awkwardness reached her also, the slow-moving shadow of a large cloud. “Yeah, so…”

“How, uh…”

Rytlock rolled his neck, scratching it. What they had was white-hot, buffeted from had to hand and never held in place for long. It was in the air between them and was about to hit the floor before Rytlock cobbled together something to say.

“So, how are you… Feeling? About… Stuff.”

“Stuff?”

“Y’know… Stuff.”

“Hungover out of my mind, unwashed and like my head’s about to pop open.”

He chuckled, blindfold crumpled over his eyes. “I’m in rough shape too, if you couldn’t tell.”

“I could.”

“Could’a lied, y’know...”

“Your whining aside, I’m feeling pretty… Good.”

He looked coy. She didn’t know what to do with it. Rytlock never looked coy. _“Good,_ huh?”

“Yeah. I am.”

“Me too, actually.”

Emberthroat sighed. “Don’t you think we’re a little too old to be…”

She waggled her paw between them. There was a lengthy silence.

“Well,” said Rytlock, “I’m glad you’re feeling… Good. Not bad, not great, just… Good. That’s perfect, actually.”

“‘Great’ would—”

“Might be a little complicated, so…”

“Good,” she said.

“Good,” he replied.

“Yeah,” she said, somewhat relieved. “Talk to you later, Brimstone. I’ve got a full, painful day ahead of me.”

“Wait, wait, Commander, hold up.”

She did, brow raised.

Rytlock gestured at her stomach with sudden confidence. “Look,” he said, “if something… ‘Pans out’, keep me in the loop.”

“It won’t,” she said, wondering if he’d take the hint.

“Huh? Oh, damn, you... And that’s fine,” he said, taking her frankness to be euphemistic. “If that’s what you’ve gotta do, that’s what you’ve gotta do. Whatever you need.”

“Brimstone…”

“But whatever shakes out, keep me informed. All I ask. And...”

There went the practised confidence. She wasn’t sure if she should feel flattered. Rytlock found his nerve and thrashed it with both hands.

“Ember, if you need anything—”

“I won’t,” she replied.

He waved her down, a ‘let me finish’. _“— Ask_. There. Spiel over.”

“I’m barren,” she said.

“Oh,” said Rytlock. “Cool.”

She blinked at him, deadpan. Rytlock’s claws slowly crept to the band of skin between his brows. He held his face, taking in a long, long hiss of air. She could barely hear him.

“Can we maybe—”

“Forget you said that?” she offered, nonplussed.

“If it’s all the same to you…”

“Look forward to replaying this conversation in the middle of the night for, oh… The rest of your natural life. Maybe in the Mists, too. Only for a decade or two. After that, we’re square.”

“Will do, boss.”

Rytlock was incapable of meeting her long, lingering look. She couldn’t tell if he was indulging in some approximation.

Maybe she was making him uncomfortable? Damn, she hated that blindfold.

The rifle misfire twenty feet under them was almost welcome. Emberthroat called out and received a call back. No injuries, but she couldn’t have people getting sloppy on the last mile.

Rytlock sniffed. “You fielding this or will I?”

“You do it. And be gentle, won’t you?”

“When am I not?”

Her gut told her he didn’t mean for that comment to be quite so charged. His posture told her that he basked in it anyway. Emberthroat brought a dainty paw to her mouth.

_“IF YOU PEOPLE DON’T GET YOUR ASS IN LINE I SWEAR I’LL PICK YOU UP BY YOUR LEGS AND FELL EVERY TREE IN THIS JUNGLE WITH YOUR THICK HEADS! DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?”_

Frantic, barked agreements from the floor under, soldiers scuttling to and fro.

“You don’t have to soften ‘em up for me, boss,” said Rytlock, feeling fussed over.

“What, and I’m not allowed to blow off some steam?”

He laughed lecherously. “Yeah, yeah...”

“See you around, Brimstone.”

“If I don’t die of a hangover.” His jagged teeth peeped over his muzzle. He said something but the words fizzled out in his throat.

“Come again?”

He paused a moment. Risks assessed he tried again, reality stark without spirits.

“I said see you later, Joz.”

He was setting himself up to be rebuked, sobriety calling her gift into question. An unambiguous lure for her ire should he prove right.

Emberthroat’s heart was corked champagne. If he stayed she was going to shake it up and spill all over him, caution be damned.

“See you around, Rytlock,” she said pleasantly, seeing his challenge and ordering him to stand down.

Rytlock nodded, loping away on all fours, an incoming nightmare for whatever poor bastards earned his ire. The short-tempered, short-statured man she loved. Another target. Another person to be killed in a way he didn’t deserve. Another river of fear branching from the wellspring.

This was one of the worst things that could happen to her.

Safely out of earshot and only when she was absolutely, positively sure nobody was looking, she threw her paws over her face, magma-red. She allowed herself this moment, this brief flash, then retook her composure. Upright and austere, mane yanked back into buns so tight it pulled her fur taut.

Damn, did it feel _good!_

**Author's Note:**

> it's my video game cat and i made her smooch the idiot
> 
> 'this character is very, very similar to crecia!' i hear you cry out, from your brain. and you'd be correct!! isn't that weird? i didn't know crecia existed when i got into pairing off embo with rytlock. i'm rolling with it. hey, maybe he's got a type!


End file.
